Exporting Performance Data

Data export is the Performance Monitor general purpose escape hatch. Just about every time we run into a limitation of Performance Monitor, we tell you to export the data and use some other tool to format or analyze it.

This is not necessarily bad. The ability to use software as building blocks was one of the fundamental principles in the construction of the very successful UNIX operating system. We have used that concept here, and it will serve you in good stead. Examining or analyzing the standard deviation of the numerical values of many chart points, printing lots of alert log entries or a large report, and making a list of all the computers being logged in a large network all rely on data export. These are normal activities of performance monitoring, and it is the explicit design of Performance Monitor that you export the data to accomplish these activities. So don't struggle, export!

The Export command on the File menu permits you to create either tab-separated or comma-separated ASCII files for use by other applications. Which you choose depends on which format your other application will best accommodate. If you want to look at the data with a simple text editor, tab-separated (the default) is the easiest to read.

Note It's worth repeating that the export of a chart of a large log file does include every data point in the time window, even though the visible chart displays only 100 data points. If you want to export the data in a log file, you must first chart that data. Once you have set up a complex chart for export, consider saving your settings in a settings file so you can reuse them.